Institutions

The Londoners, Portraits of a Working City, 1447 to 1980, was an exhibition at London Metropolitan Archives and Guildhall Yard in 2017. The images in this gallery provide a glimpse of the old photographs, drawings and prints of Londoners in the archive collections that were displayed.

Face to Face with the People of London's Past.

From politicians to servants, nurses to rat catchers, London has long been a magnet for those looking for work. Winners, losers, the famous and the forgotten, images of countless Londoners have been recorded as they went about their daily work in the capital.

The collections at London Metropolitan Archives contain an extraordinary range of these images; old photographs, prints and drawings of everyday Londoners who have lived and worked in the capital for the last 500 years. Selecting from such a wealth of material was a significant challenge but we have tried to present a representative group that show some of the jobs and professions that appear in the archive collections. Many are strangely familiar, suggesting that little changed across more than five centuries, others are something of a mystery today.

Portraits of the wealthy and famous appear alongside many who are simply unknown, recorded only because of the work that they did and the service they gave to the city and their fellow Londoners. From a fifteenth century Alderman to a twentieth century trapeze artist, this exhibition brings them all together and presents them as the history of our capital.

To see more images of Londoners past and present, try searching or using the subject lists on our Advanced Search page. If you want to delve further into the working lives of Londoners, we recommend a visit to London Metropolitan Archives.